What excites me about Occupy Santa Rosa (OSR) is watching the speed with which learning and awareness occurs and seeing all of the things sprouting from the sacred space that #Occupy is holding open for all humans.
What worries me most is its openly-stated openness to all comers without even the barest guidelines for community conduct aside from non-violence. In Santa Rosa, as in almost every one of the #Occupy locations I’m aware of, we’re having serious problems with criminals, addicts and the mentally challenged. In many cases authorities are telling these people to come to our camps and I think we are all suffering from the intended results.
The movement must mature and impose some adult conditions, backed up by teeth, to remove disrupters, for anyone who violates community agreements specifically tailored to the realities and needs of each location. Speaking for the 99% does not mandate sinking to the lowest common denominator found therein. Tribal models are by far, in my opinion, the best way to do this. After all, that’s what our species used for perhaps 40,000 years and they worked! We were all tribal once.
At OSR we are moving towards a Community Supported Occupations (CSOs), in partnership with Transition activists, permaculture food growers and local businesses and interest groups that are already politically well-respected within the community. There is real power in that and even Santa Rosa City Council has come to the realisation that in a very short time the only things left capable of maintaining order and achieving anything will be local governments and the resources of each particular community.
We believe that setting and enforcing a global template beyond the barest standards is both unwise and foolish. Look at Europe. Any attempt to bind or make things bigger is doomed to fail. Systems break down, not up. OSR is deeply imbued with the core beliefs of #Occupy so does not need and is not asking for top-down hierarchical support. The possibility of useful solutions emerging decreases inversely with application of imposed global solutions. That is the antithesis of what this movement is about.
We would be extremely suspicious of any group seeking to influence or manage the entire movement. And the truth is, I think, that most #Occupy camps would just rightly ignore anything that came down to them this way.
I believe that your greatest achievement at Occupy London has been replacing violent UK riots with peaceful demonstrations, and through your moral courage, compelling the Church of England to examine itself and choose whether it serves God or Mammon. The entire movement is grateful to Occupy London for that because these are the places where something real must be changed before substantive and productive reform can take root and flourish elsewhere.
If I were to design a flag for #Occupy, our symbol would be the tent. Has anyone ever seen a mortgage on a tent? A two-car garage? A satellite dish?
The tent is our symbol of our true freedom from The Matrix and it has been from the start. The tent symbolizes our inner and outer liberation from all the traps of industrial civilization. If Occupiers around the world began demonstrating that it is possible to live a happy and more fulfilling life free from all the crap of industrial civilization, we will have achieved victory. It was our tents that scared the bad guys more than anything – and I don’t know if the movement ever really appreciated that.
Let’s bear that in mind as we all move forward together into 2012.
By Mike Ruppert
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